Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site fortune.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!ihnp4!fortune!brower
From: brower@fortune.UUCP (Richard Brower)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: Charley Wingate's race hatred (con't)
Message-ID: <5223@fortune.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 29-Apr-85 19:00:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: fortune.5223
Posted: Mon Apr 29 19:00:50 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 30-Apr-85 07:38:10 EDT
References: <24898@lanl.ARPA>
Reply-To: brower@fortune.UUCP (Richard brower)
Distribution: net
Organization: Fortune Systems, Redwood City, CA
Lines: 41
Summary: 

In article <24898@lanl.ARPA> wkp@lanl.ARPA writes:
>     Your statement about the average German soldier is an affront to 
>     Christian civilization.  Not being able to influence things one way
>     or another is a poor excuse for introducing people to Zyklon-B.   
>     Maybe that's what you would have done.  But at least a few Christians
>     (like Bonhoeffer) died for their beliefs.                   
>
>     Finally, if you want to honor German war dead, visit the graves of      
>     Bonhoeffer and other resistance fighters.  Visit the graves of German
>     citizens who died for simply being Jews.
>     
>     To visit the graves of mass-murdering monsters to show solidarity
>     with a nation is even below a Charley Wingate.  What's your next idea,
>     Chuckles?  Maybe going on a picnic to celebrate the massacres of the  
>     American Indians?
>--
>
>bill peter                              ihnp4!lanl!wkp

Now hold on a second, here.  Should we take American soldiers who died
fighting American Indians out of our National Cemeteries because it was
genocide they were performing?  How about Viet Nam dead?  It seems to be
the national consensus that that war was wrong.  Isn't there 
some chance we will do them honor by leaving them there?  Well, I do not
think so.  Those poor guys were just out doing a job for their country.
It may have been a job that should not have been done, but there are laws
and rules that soldiers must follow.  And they deserve honor.

While I in no way wish to do any honor to SS Death Camp Goons, let us not
be so down on the poor soldier who was doing his job.  Some, perhaps most
even, of the people buried in that graveyard were just soldiers fighting
for their homeland and country.  In that, they may have been misguided,
suckered, and lied to.  Many people, including you apparently, seem to
want to blame the whole German people for the actions of WWII, but this
is just as wrong as the actions you comdemn.  German soldiers, not involved
in the death camps, deserve honor for being good soldiers just as dead
American soldiers do.  Not everybody can be a resistance hero.

-- 
Richard A. Brower		Fortune Systems
{ihnp4,ucbvax!amd,hpda,sri-unix,harpo}!fortune!brower